Who is My Enemy? Winter 2001

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Four impossible commands are woven into the Bible, all beginning with the word love. The first and greatest commandment, according to Jesus, was to love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. Any rabbi would have agreed. But Jesus followed that well-known sound bite with an obscure quote from Leviticus. "A second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'"

Then Jesus added two brand new commands of his own. At the climax of the Gospel of John, Jesus told his disciples neither to love God nor to love their neighbors, but to "love one another." And in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus flatly overturned conventional rabbinic wisdom: "You have heard it said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you … "

Love God. Love your neighbor. Love one another. Love your enemies. They are the love-commands of the Gospels, and when you think about it, the three that have to do with our love for people-neighbors, fellow disciples, enemies-sit rather uneasily together. This issue of RQ sits at that tense intersection, and if there is a thread that ties our cover stories together, it is our suspicion that the three are not as different as you might think.

The events of late 2001 might seem to prove just the opposite. America has been attacked by terrorists from the other side of the globe. Surely in this case our enemies are very different from our neighbors, much less anyone we would recognize as "one another."

But Islamic radicals' hatred for America comes precisely from the tight quarters of a globalized world. America has moved into the neighborhood of the Muslim world, with American troops stationed in the holy kingdom of Saudi Arabia and American ...

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